updated 09:45 am EST, Thu February 26, 2009

Apple shareholder Q-and-A

Apple's board of directors faced pointed questions during Wednesday's shareholders' meeting, directed a variety of topics. In a Q&A session held during the event, the topic immediately switched to the health of CEO Steve Jobs, whose absence from the room served as a reminder that the executive is on an extended medical leave through the month of June. Board member Arthur Levinson attempted to reassure shareholders, explaining that the group discloses information when it is considered both important and proper to do so. Possible succession plans come up regularly in talks, said Levinson.

Apple's chief operating officer, Tim Cook, fielded another question about the company's decision to abandon the Macworld Expo, which it helped anchor and frequently used as a platform for new product announcements. Cook insisted that while the company has "very fond memories" of Macworld, it now has over 250 retail stores, said to provide "many, many Macworlds each week." Press events can be scheduled when the stores are not enough, Cook elaborated, commenting that the decision to leave Macworld had "nothing to do" with Apple disliking the event.

The company was lastly challenged on a lack of professional first-party web design software, the only alternative being the layman-oriented iWeb. Apple's senior VP of product marketing, Phil Schiller, commented that the company does not want to try and fill every product niche available. "For the foreseeable future, [no pro software is] the case," he remarked.

People attending the meeting also led the crowd in singing happy birthday to Jobs, who turned 54 the day before. Cook promised to pass along the sentiment.

see any sense in spending large amounts of money at MacWorld when its large number of stores would, in the end, accomplish the same things. MacWorld became an event more about 3rd party sellers... I loved MacWorld too though I had only been to 3 of them...Lack of Professional Web software... you non-business people don't get it. When you try to become everything to everybody you lose focus. He didn't say NO, it's just not the right time. Apple has become an integrator not a distributor. However, I do expect Apple will make some big improvements to iWeb to keep the chatter down.

Apple sez 'it now has over 250 retail stores, said to provide "many, many Macworlds each week." ' That's a very Apple-centric view. For me, even visiting all 250 Apple stores wouldn't show me what one MacWorld Expo would. That's my me-centric view.

There's many reasons to leave MacWorld expo. Costs way too much. Not needed as much with the advent of the interweb. Ends up requiring the company to develop around the event, and risk being berated because you didn't release product X. Overlaps with other trade shows that are likely to reach more customers (the electronics show in Vegas, for example, that goes on at the same time).

And, to sligett, it really isn't Apple's purpose in life to go to a show because it helps you find more products. You can still go to MWSF, see all the third-party developers, check out the new stuff. It just won't have Apple.

However, to say "We've got stores, we can do an expo every day!" is just c***. There's no Steve keynote. No large presentation. Nothing to really focus on. The only thing is does have is normally a collection of mac-heads who like to hang out at the apple store.

And maybe Tim Cook didn't notice, but while there may be 250 stores, there's still many a places in the great land of ours that neither has a store, nor a store anywhere close by.

There's many reasons to leave MacWorld expo. Costs way too much. Not needed as much with the advent of the interweb. Ends up requiring the company to develop around the event, and risk being berated because you didn't release product X. Overlaps with other trade shows that are likely to reach more customers (the electronics show in Vegas, for example, that goes on at the same time).

And, to sligett, it really isn't Apple's purpose in life to go to a show because it helps you find more products. You can still go to MWSF, see all the third-party developers, check out the new stuff. It just won't have Apple.

However, to say "We've got stores, we can do an expo every day!" is just c***. There's no Steve keynote. No large presentation. Nothing to really focus on. The only thing is does have is normally a collection of mac-heads who like to hang out at the apple store.

And maybe Tim Cook didn't notice, but while there may be 250 stores, there's still many a places in the great land of ours that neither has a store, nor a store anywhere close by.

testudo, there's far fewer places that have a MacWorld Expo nearby. In fact, there's 249 places. Only San Fransisco has a MacWorld Expo, or did. So, while not everyone can get to an Apple Store easily, they can get there far easier than they can get to MacWorld. And Steve could do a live keynote to all the Apple Stores simultaneously very easily, and it'd be easier on him to do that.

i always wanted to go to MacWorld SF but never made it. Why? It's 350 miles away. However, many times I have gone into the AppleStores near me, to see what's what and (most recently) to buy a computer.

I did miss seeing the Omni guys at MWSF, but I can see their software through online videos and ctommunicate with them through email. So... no biggie.